Chapter 23 - Tusk until dawn

  Night fell without ceremony, as it always did on that ungrateful planet. There was no real shift in light, only a slow transition into a thicker, closer black. The sky was covered by an uneven layer of low clouds that promised no rain, only shadow. The wind barely moved. Everything felt suspended, expectant.

  Constantina remained seated beside the extinguished fire, her hands resting on her knees, her back straight out of pure inertia. No one had suggested lighting it again. It did not need to be said: the night was not for warmth.

  Around her, the squad pretended to sleep.

  It was a clumsy fiction, but a shared one. Garran lay on his side, rifle against his chest, breathing far too steadily. Hishio’s eyes were closed, though his eyelids were tense, as if he feared sleep might betray him. Yolanda lay on her back, staring at the dark sky without blinking, counting something in silence, perhaps seconds, perhaps past mistakes.

  Diemano lay a few meters away, hood up, one hand near his weapon. He was not looking at Constantina, but she knew he was awake. She felt it in that alert stillness, in that way of occupying space without ever fully relaxing. It was the same posture he adopted before an ambush, or before saying something important and choosing not to.

  Further off, separated by a distance that was no longer only physical, was Cruger’s group.

  They were distinguishable by small things: a muffled laugh that cut off too quickly, a sudden movement, the snap of poorly settled metal. They slept badly, if they slept at all. Not because they suspected anything specific, but because Cruger never slept peacefully. And when he did not sleep, no one else did either.

  Constantina closed her eyes for a moment.

  There was no heroic plan. No clean certainty. Only a decision made with a tight stomach and a head full of noise.

  She had spent the entire day telling herself it was the right thing. That she could not let this continue. That what had happened to Div Kut was not an isolated accident, but a direct consequence of having placed Cruger where he was. Of having accepted his presence. Of not having known how to say no in time.

  Fucking Kael Durnan, she thought, without a trace of irony.

  Fucking for putting her there.

  Fucking for giving her a role she still did not know how to occupy.

  But the guilt did not leave with that. Not truly.

  Her gaze shifted to Div Kut.

  He was sitting, not lying down. Knees drawn up, arms wrapped around them with almost childish force. His face buried in shadow. He was not looking at anyone. Not looking at anything. His eyes were open, but they did not seem to register the camp, the night, not even his own body.

  It was as if he had remained in another moment. One Constantina could not reach.

  She had tried to speak to him. Several times. With clumsy words, with long silences, with a hand extended and withdrawn just in time. All of it had failed. Each attempt had only made clearer what she already knew and did not want to accept: she was not prepared for that. For the aftermath.

  Div Kut lifted his gaze slightly, as if he had felt her watching. Their eyes met for a second. There was no reproach in his. No plea for help either. Only something flat, desolating. A mute acknowledgment.

  Constantina looked away first.

  That hurt more than she expected.

  She thought of Volosko. His low, pragmatic voice. The way he had said end all of this as if he were discussing closing a poorly designed deal. There had been no hatred in him. No justice either. Only calculation.

  Five of twelve, he had said.

  Enough.

  Not too many.

  The logic repelled her. And at the same time, it calmed her.

  She ran a hand over her face. Her skin felt tight, the muscles in her neck rigid. Her body demanded movement, action, something to break the unbearable waiting. But she knew the worst mistake would be to move too soon.

  It had to be tonight.

  It had to be this way.

  If she waited longer, she might truly begin to doubt.

  And if she doubted, she would do nothing.

  And if she did nothing, she already knew what came next.

  In the distance, Cruger let out a brief, rough laugh that died almost immediately. Someone from his group responded with a complicit murmur.

  Constantina clenched her teeth.

  For a fleeting instant, she allowed herself to imagine it: Cruger’s skull beneath her boot. The dry crack. The simple end. A quick, useless fantasy that resolved nothing.

  That was not what would happen.

  She opened her eyes. The camp remained the same. Everyone still. Everyone ready. No one asleep.

  The night moved forward slowly, as if it knew something was about to break and wanted to see it up close.

  Constantina took a deep breath.

  There was no turning back.

  Volosko emerged from the darkness with the natural ease of someone who never doubts his place. He made no sound as he walked. It seemed as if the camp had opened to let him pass. Five more soldiers advanced behind him, spaced just enough not to hinder one another, bound by a shared tension. They did not speak. There was no need.

  Constantina saw them approach and felt the air change. It was not fear. It was something drier. An uncomfortable certainty.

  Volosko stopped in front of her.

  “Are we?” he asked.

  His voice was low, steady. He was not trying to convince anyone. Only to confirm that they had all reached the same point of no return.

  Diemano answered first. He nodded briefly without looking at her. Garran pressed his lips together and smiled sideways, his knuckles white around his weapon.

  “We’re going to tear them apart,” he murmured.

  Constantina immediately raised her hand, the gesture firm but charged with an anxiety she failed to hide.

  “Cruger stays alive,” she said. “No matter what. Alive.”

  The glances crossed for a second. No one objected. Volosko inclined his head slightly, accepting the condition as if noting an operational detail.

  “We move.”

  They advanced together, fast but without running. The sleeping camp looked unreal, like bodies loaned to the night. The tents aligned like improvised graves. The ground crunched under their boots, but no one startled. It was a deceptive stillness, the kind that exists only before something irreversible.

  The first shots were dry, muffled. Brief flashes. Bodies falling without even understanding. One soldier tried to rise and took a direct hit to the neck. Another turned with a choked cry that died in his throat. Cruger’s group collapsed within seconds.

  There was no fight. There was execution.

  When Cruger woke, he did so abruptly, with a violent breath that pulled him upright. His eyes took barely a second to adjust to the scene. Too fast for someone half asleep. Too lucid.

  He saw the weapons.

  He saw the bodies.

  He saw the circle closing.

  And he smiled.

  A wide smile, almost delighted, as if something had finally unfolded as expected.

  “I always knew you were a traitor, Volosko,” he said, laughing. “Always too tidy for this filth.”

  Volosko observed him with a calm that was neither compassion nor rage. It was belated evaluation.

  “You were harming us,” he replied. “Dividing groups. Breaking agreements. You were useless.”

  Cruger spat blood, still smiling.

  “That’s it? Productivity?” he laughed. “How disappointing.”

  Then he turned his head.

  Searching.

  For something.

  Or someone.

  When he saw Div Kut, his smile changed. Slower now. More intentional.

  “I’m really going to miss you,” he said. “You were fun.”

  He blew him an exaggerated kiss.

  Constantina’s kick came without warning.

  A direct strike to the head. The sound was hollow and sharp. Cruger fell onto his side, but even on the ground he laughed, hoarse and disjointed.

  “Now,” she said, turning toward Div Kut. “Now.”

  Div Kut did not react.

  He was rigid, as if his muscles no longer responded to the present. He stared at Cruger’s body without fully seeing it. His eyes seemed fixed on another scene, superimposed, impossible to share.

  “Do it,” Constantina insisted. “End this. It will help you.”

  Nothing.

  The silence grew uncomfortable, heavy. Constantina felt something slipping through her fingers. The idea of control, perhaps.

  She approached him, grabbed his arm roughly.

  Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author's preferred platform and support their work!

  “Hit him!” she ordered. “Stop looking at him and hit him!”

  She shoved him forward.

  Div Kut took an awkward step. Then another. He lifted his foot.

  The first blow was uncoordinated. The second, firmer. The third, brutal.

  Cruger laughed. Coughed. His body began to produce sounds that were no longer human.

  And then Constantina heard another laugh.

  A high laugh, out of place, too loud for the night.

  Div Kut was laughing.

  Laughing as he kicked, as he delivered blows without rhythm, without pause. Cruger’s body stopped moving, but Div Kut did not. He continued. As if the target were no longer him, but something not there.

  They had to restrain him.

  Hands on shoulders. Arms crossing. Collective weight imposing itself.

  “Enough!” someone shouted.

  “Div Kut, stop!” Volosko roared. “Now!”

  Div Kut froze abruptly, as if the voice had flipped an invisible switch. He breathed hard. Eyes open, wet, lost.

  “Leave me alone with the body,” he said. “Please.”

  Constantina shook her head immediately, without thinking.

  “No.”

  Div Kut lunged at her with unexpected force. He knocked her to the ground. Tried to cling, to bite, to disappear. They pulled him off by force. Brief shouts. The dull sound of bodies colliding.

  Volosko spoke again, quieter.

  “It’s over.”

  The camp fell silent once more. A different silence now. Not expectant. Final.

  “Now we can sleep,” Volosko said, wiping blood from his sleeve. “Tomorrow we continue.”

  They walked away without looking back.

  Chuet approached Constantina as they moved, his voice barely a thread.

  “Hand… are you sure about what you just did?”

  Constantina did not answer immediately.

  She looked at Div Kut, held at a distance, silent again. She looked at her own hands, still trembling.

  She did not know.

  And that doubt, late and heavy, settled in her chest like something that would not leave.

  Dawn brought no rest.

  The pit was quieter than usual, but not more peaceful. The silence had weight. It clung to their bodies like a second skin. Nolan had tried to close his eyes several times, but each time he did he felt the stare.

  Harlan was not sleeping.

  He was slumped against the damp wall, knees pressed to his chest, eyes open and fixed on some point behind Nolan. He did not blink. He did not speak. He only stared. As if waiting for something to manifest behind flesh, as if the air itself might betray hidden treachery.

  Nolan held that gaze for a few seconds longer. There was no hatred in it. There was fear. But not a clean fear. It was directed.

  At him.

  He swallowed and looked away first.

  He could not stay there.

  He rose slowly, careful not to draw the attention of the guards patrolling above. The stench was stronger at dawn; it seemed to condense when the air cooled. He moved between bodies that were asleep or pretending to be. No one spoke.

  Rodrick Viulk was where they had left him. Reclined against the rock, one leg stretched out, the other bent. Arms crossed. He was not sleeping. His gaze was fixed on the darkness, as if reading something invisible.

  Nolan stopped a meter away.

  “Can I sit?” he asked quietly.

  Rodrick turned his head slightly. There was no surprise in his eyes.

  “You can,” he replied.

  Nolan lowered himself against the opposite wall. The cold stone cut through his back.

  For a few seconds neither spoke. The distant sound of wind slipping through the mouth of the pit was the only thing breaking the silence.

  Nolan decided to go straight to it.

  “What is the Orphean Order?”

  Rodrick did not answer immediately. His fingers moved once, faintly, as if counting something in the air.

  “I don’t know exactly,” he said at last. “I don’t know where they came from. I don’t know who founded them. I don’t know if they existed before I ever heard of them.”

  His voice was dry. Without dramatics.

  “But they have something,” he continued. “Something that should not exist.”

  Nolan held his breath.

  “What?”

  “They see.”

  The word hung there.

  “They see the past, the present, and the future,” Rodrick added. “Not as a guess. Not as a calculation. They see it. Whether they are there or not. Whether they intervened or not.”

  Nolan frowned.

  “Can you do it too?”

  Rodrick shook his head.

  “No.”

  There was no shame in the answer. No frustration either.

  “Then how do you trust them?” Nolan pressed. “How do you know they aren’t manipulating you?”

  Rodrick looked at him directly for the first time.

  “Because they told me things no one could know.”

  His tone did not change.

  “Dates. Private conversations. Decisions I had not yet made. Then they told me what would happen. And it happened.”

  Nolan felt a knot tighten in his stomach.

  “And what is their objective?”

  Rodrick looked toward the entrance of the pit, where a dying torch cast long shadows.

  “They say they want to fulfill time. Not change it. Not divert it. Fulfill it. They believe time is sacred, and that any deviation could become a chaos of destruction.”

  Nolan let out a brief, nervous laugh.

  “That doesn’t mean anything.”

  “It means everything,” Rodrick replied. “It means that if something is meant to happen, it will happen. With or without us.”

  Silence settled between them again.

  Nolan hesitated before asking the next question.

  “And what do you want?”

  Rodrick did not take his eyes off the darkness.

  “Tomorrow,” he said, “I am going to meet someone.”

  His jaw tightened slightly.

  “Someone who did great harm to someone I loved.”

  Nolan felt the name before he spoke it.

  “Your son?”

  Rodrick nodded once.

  “John.”

  The name was spoken without tremor.

  “The rumors said that’s why you disappeared after the Balmorean invasion,” Nolan murmured.

  Rodrick cut him off.

  “That doesn’t matter.”

  His voice was harder now.

  “The only thing that matters is that you survive until I return. Until I make sure that Balmorean pays.”

  There was no rage in his tone. Only determination.

  Nolan swallowed.

  “And after?”

  Rodrick looked at him as if the question were irrelevant.

  “After, we’ll see.”

  The pit creaked with the movement of some prisoner shifting position. Harlan muttered something incoherent in the distance.

  Nolan glanced toward his companion and then back at Rodrick.

  “Is there no way to save him?” he asked quietly. “Harlan.”

  Rodrick did not answer at once.

  His gaze softened just slightly.

  “I’m sorry,” he said at last. “No.”

  Nolan felt something close in his chest.

  “You need to think about your own survival,” Rodrick continued. “Your life is essential.”

  Nolan looked up.

  “Essential for what?”

  Rodrick held his gaze in silence for a few seconds.

  “For things to unfold as they must. But your role in particular is more significant than that of an average person.”

  He did not explain further.

  The air thickened again.

  Nolan rested his head against the rock and closed his eyes for a moment. Harlan was still staring at him from the darkness.

  Rodrick did not sleep either.

  They remained seated there, sharing the stench, the cold, and the waiting.

  Two men in a common grave.

  One convinced that time was already written.

  The other wondering whether there was still room to choose.

  The night had not fully withdrawn, but dawn was already beginning to tear at the edges of the horizon. The air smelled of tunnel dust, rusted iron, skin wilted by sweat and confinement. After walking for hours through the auxiliary conduit, Dossian’s squad had reached a natural vent that opened onto a rocky formation hidden among volcanic outcroppings.

  Reis was the first to emerge. His eyes were red, his clothes caked with dried mud, his hands clenched tight from the weight of his rifle. Behind him, the other soldiers surfaced one by one, like nocturnal animals being born again under the sun.

  “Tunnel clear,” Reis reported quietly, tapping his communicator. “Three hundred meters of visual line. No sentries in sight.”

  Dossian nodded without speaking. His face was a mask of concentration, but his eyes were fixed on what lay beyond the rocky slit: an uneven plain scattered with makeshift structures and tents assembled from dark tarps. In the distance, atop a raised plateau, stood the main Balmorean base. According to Akhven, at least five thousand fighters were sheltering there.

  Five thousand lives. And a handful of soldiers to cut through them.

  “This is Owl Squad,” Dossian said over the radio, activating the encrypted Universal Government channel. “We have visual confirmation of the base. Density confirmed high. Send coordinates for priority asset security.”

  A few seconds later, the reply came, wrapped in the cold administrative tone that seemed oblivious to what was about to be unleashed.

  “Owl Squad, focus your advance on the transmitted coordinates. Priority target: underground stockpile area identified as ‘CORE G.’ Centralized allied assault will begin at 06:00. You are to secure the infrastructure before impact.”

  Reis swallowed. No one spoke, but they all understood what it meant: they would be in the middle of hell when it began. There was no immediate extraction plan. No reinforcements. Their task was not to fight. It was to endure.

  Alis stepped closer to Reis, her face streaked with ash and dirt. She brushed his arm lightly.

  “Do you know what time it is?”

  Reis checked his tactical watch. 05:18.

  Forty-two minutes until sunrise. Forty-two minutes until detonation.

  “Take a breath,” Alis said simply. “You won’t get one later.”

  He nodded, but he did not.

  Behind them, Dossian moved toward the edge of the elevation, crouched low in the brush. Beside him walked Akhven, the prisoner, taking short steps, his hands still bound but his eyes alert, almost alive.

  “You’re going to guide us,” Dossian said. “And if you make any signal we don’t understand, if you take one wrong turn, I’ll cut your tongue out and then I’ll kill you. Understood?”

  Akhven nodded without fear, as if he had accepted that possibility days ago.

  “The entrance to the core is beyond the second cluster of tents. There’s a buried hatch. It opens with hydraulic pressure. If you made it this far, you can get inside. If you survive… that doesn’t depend on me.”

  Dossian turned to the rest of the squad. The air had grown almost motionless. No wind. No insects. Only the distant hum of industrial machinery.

  “Listen carefully.” His voice was deep, stripped of grandeur. “We are not heroes. We are not martyrs. Our task is to enter, secure the position, and hold until reinforcements arrive. If you fall, you will not be remembered. If you survive, perhaps not either. But the infrastructure must hold.”

  A brief silence followed.

  “And if anyone thinks they cannot do this, say it now. No one will judge you.”

  No one spoke.

  Only Reis lifted his chin.

  “And after?”

  Dossian met his gaze.

  “After, if we’re still alive, you’ll be able to choose what kind of soldier you want to be.”

  Without another word, Dossian rose and began descending toward the base, followed by the prisoner and then the rest. There was no music. No march. Only the crunch of boots on dry earth and the first ray of sunlight touching Kael Durnan’s face on the other side of the valley, still unaware that in less than an hour, his entire world was going to explode.

  Hello, dear reader!